Alright so like I said I went to Regionals yesterday here in Columbus. The event ended up hitting its 240 person cap so we played 9 rounds with the cut to Top 8. I ended up going 7-1-1, making Top 8 and then losing in the quarterfinals with the below list:
My matchups went as follow, I won't go into anything as it just standard play. I will say that I probably had a 55/45 split between games won via combo vs games won via beatdown. That said, there were certainly countless times where my opponents made sub-optimal plays in order to respect a potential combo, which is obviously one of the decks greatest strengths.
Round 1: 5 Color Zoo (2-0)
Round 2: Jeskai Control (2-1)
Round 3: UW Control (2-1)
Round 4: Zur?! (2-0)
Round 5: Goryo's As Foretold (0-2)
Round 6: RG Valakut (2-1)
Round 7: Affinity (2-1)
Round 8: Burn (2-0)
Round 9: ID
Top 8: Zoo (0-2)
All of the matches that I had felt winnable except the As Foretold deck where he killed me on Turn 3 in both games. Honestly, I have no idea if we can do ANYTHING against them except play stuff like RiP or maybe Loaming Shaman? I am not really concerned about fixing the matchup and will glady take the auto-loss here. RG Valkaut is also a fairly bad matchup and I was only able to win Game 2 by turboing out the combo and Game 3 by my opponent misplaying and attempting to pay a Pact trigger with only 1 Forest in play while I had a Magus. I may want something else going forward for this matchup.
Both of my control games felt a little unfavored preboard but very favored postboard. The aggro decks that I was worried about with previous iterations of the deck are much easier with the inclusion of Reflector Mage and Justice out of the board.
While I didn't play against Humans, Hollow One, or Mardu I tested extensively against all 3 of those decks and feel them to be even to favorable matchups. Reflector Mage pulls a lot of weight against the first two.
As for individual card choices:
-Shalai over-performed all day. It was lights out against Burn and was a nice roadblock against Valakut.
-Huntmaster, however, was meh all day. Whenever I tutored it was almost ways for Shalai first or Guardian if I was going for the combo. When I casted him from hand he was never amazing but was overall okay. P&K may be a better card here, though there were plenty of times that I would have been unable to cast P&K where Huntmaster would have been castable.
-Rallier was also very good all day. There was only 1 time during the day where I had to cast a naked Rallier and even then it served as a removal spell to trade in combat. It consistently dug me out of games all day by either generating card draw via Oath or Canopy or just generating value with Voice. As I have always felt, the card is a cornerstone of the deck and I will continue playing 4.
-Kiki was good. It was stuck in my hand on a couple of occasions and I was able to cast it from hand in the Top 8 where it could have done more had I not had to mull to 5. I think it has warranted it's spot.
-SB was fine. Teeg was great against control. I never saw Eidolon and if I don't expect any Storm maybe I don't need it and with Shalai being in the deck maybe I could use the slot for other, more common matchups, but I know the first time I die to a Grapeshot because I decided to cut it I am going to want to die.
Also, I had a friend come with a list very similar to the Atlanta list. He went 6-3. There was another guy playing the deck there as well. I didn't see very many of his game but he was still playing Sun Titan. I believe he also went 6-3.
Koopa: Good job! Your feeling regarding Huntmaster is very much in line with my experiences of it. What are your thoughts regarding Tireless Tracker? I haven't gotten to try it out myself and don't really feel that it fits in this deck. Do you ever Evolution for it? Also, have you tried some colorless lands such as Ghost Quarter and/or Gavony Township? I'm currently playing both and think they're both great. Very seldom they cause mana problems and their upside is bigger than their occasional downside.
I really like Tracker. In a grindy matchup like Jund I will often Evo for it then play a fetch and feel like I am so far ahead. The deck is mana hungry, which means we play a lot of mana sources, which can lead to mana flood every now and then. Tracker is the perfect card to use all of that extra mana.
Also, when you have Cobra and Tracker, its like playing a free Divination every turn. It's glorious.
As for colorless lands, I haven't tested any. Our mana is good but certainly greedy and while I love me some Township, I don't know if the mana can support it. Again, I haven't tested, but in my games so far I have had plenty of opening starts where a colorless land would have really hurt my mana
@Koopa, congrats on the nice finish. How did 2 Felidar Guardians feel to you? My lists with Kiki have always run 4, as I'm angling to combo a fair amount of the time. Even with Shalai, I still dig having access to Eidolon in the board. It's redundancy against Storm, and puts in work against decks like Burn, Elves, and Living End.
@Siefer: I've always played two Felidar. Between the two amd Evo I always feel like I have access to a Guardian and while I don't mind getting a value blink out of Feldiar, I rarely want to naturally draw more than two in any given match as the 1/4 body is quite anemic.
I took the following list to my local LGS for my first run piloting it after following the boards for awhile and becoming intrigued with all the play this deck has to offer:
Round 1: Fight!
UR Storm (2-1 games, 1-0 overall)
Game 1: He stumbles on lands and I beat him down value-wise without revealing the combo.
Game 2: I smugly drop Shalai thinking I had some time. However, He just went off and killed the Shalai before directing the rest of the damage at me with double Grapeshot.
Game 3: I have the nuts. I go turn 1 Forest, Birds of Paradise. He Serum Visions. Turn 2 I drop Lotus Cobra, drop and crack a fetch, play Saheeli Rai. He drops Baral. Turn three I drop a Felidar Guardian and win. He had a Remand but did not respect the combo.
Round 2: Fight!
Jund (1-1-1 games, 1-0-1 overall)
Game 1: I play the attrition war and got a lot of mileage out of copying a Voice of Resurgence with Kiki-Jiki. Unfortunately, I was low on life and could not profitably attack without leaving myself vulnerable. Game went on forever and my combo was not forthcoming, but I eventually see it and get the win as time expired.
Game 2: He plays fat and shreds my hand.
Game 3: He didn't think we should even start the game as we wouldn't have enough time. I said that I would really like to see what happens. I kept a reasonable hand with Saheeli Rai, Birds of Paradise, and Oath of Nissa X 2. It seemed like my best chance to get there, but I could not find the Felidar Guardian to seal the deal and we ended up drawing.
Note: My opponent played s.l.o.w. and I unfortunately got lulled into his style and let him do it.
Round 3: Fight!
Elves (2-1 match, 2-0-1 overall)
Game 1: I have a reasonable hand, but he absolutely splooges elves all over the board and empties his hand on turn three, swinging for roughly a billion on turn four thanks to Ezuri.
Game 2: Fiery Justice decimates all of his important elves, leaving me ample time to combo off at leisure.
Game 3: My favorite Fiery Justice play of the night. He turn one forest, heritage druid. Turn two he casts Dwynen's Elite and follows that up with two more Heritage Druids and another Elvish Mystic. He did not play a land, so I Fiery Justice all of his mana dudes for a 5-for-1 as he wistfully looked at the bomb in his hand that undoubtedly would have been bad times for me had he been able to untap. We usually win after a 5-for-1.
Thoughts
The deck is great fun, though I am unsure about Sun Titan. I am considering adding Tireless Trackers to the side. Any other thoughts about the deck?
By the way, I cracked a Karn and a History of Benalia. Good times!
How do you guys sideboard vs Humans? That matchup is by far the worst in my experience.
My most recent list is built with a primary goal of making the Humans matchup manageable. My swaps are -1 Rallier, -1 Slime, -1 Titan, -1 Evo, -1 Saheeli for +1 Abrade, +2 Justice, +1 Worship, +1 Ambusher. Running four Felidars and Kiki has made a tremendous difference in getting around T2 Meddling Mage snap-naming Saheeli when we’re on the draw. I respectfully disagree with maniospas about aiming to outgrind Humans — I feel that we want to take out their Meddling Mage / Freebooter / Aruiok with removal and then combo out as quickly as possible because they have such a high threat density that they will almost always end up punching through with Mantis Riders, Malcontents, Freebooters, etc. Towards that end I’ve added two more Hierarchs and swapped to Walls over Voice to accelerate things.
Magus of the Disk seems risky: If they have Reflector Mage or Dismember to answer it, you'll have trouble coming back from that tempo swing. Also, it kills your own stuff (except for Saheeli), so the opponent will get time to maybe draw some more Mantis Riders.
If you want put a high priority on beating Humans, play 2 Worship in your sideboard. I think it's by far the best card in this specific matchup (but not quite as good vs Affinity, Hollow One etc). Other than that, play cards that interact favorably with Mantis Rider. We can hold the ground most of the time and their disruption doesn't hit us all that hard, but flying beaters are very problematic.
What do you guys think is the best cheap spot removal vs Humans? It would be Path but it's such an obvious choice with Meddling Mage, I wouldn't go all in on that. Lightning Bolt? Condemn?
I've spent some time recently trying to tinker with this deck and thought I'd share a list I recently played (that I might have made some hasty modifications pre-event) and where I'm trying to go next.
First, a list I played at a tournament last Sunday, which might have been derailed by some last-minute changes inspired by beakid's 5-0 list from June 1st:
There's numerous problems with this list that I'll just spit out right now: Steam Vents is extremely bad (I knew I was going to be heavier in blue than others but the card is so much worse than the eleventh fetch and it's not close.), Glen Elendra Archmage isn't the Shalai I wanted (Archmage tested pretty well actually until I remembered Shalai exists, Archmage replaces a Baloth in the SB if I get it), the 4th Evolution absolutely should be there (especially on only two Cats), and I'm probably never going to play Gaddock Teeg in the main ever again unless a strong metagame shift calls for it. I think the biggest problem is that I got a little too cute and stopped trying to be a combo deck. I went 2-3-1, only assembling the combo in a single game, and only had the ability to go for it one other time, where the Humans player Gut Shot me, though I still had to go for it because my only cards in hand were Voices and there was a Meddling Mage in play naming Voice. I did assemble Kiki + Thragtusk in game 1 to beat a triple Thalia's Lieutenant draw, so that was pretty hot.
That being said, there's a lot of successful stuff going on in this list that I want to mention too. We'll start with the elephant in the room: Rogue Refiner. Rogue Refiner is gas. As an outsider, I noticed that a lot of the deck's three drops are extremely susceptible to a strict and detrimental timing window. Reflector Mage would prefer to be held to bounce an impactful card, Tireless Tracker is not-so-secretly a four drop, and Renegade Rallier for no value is not what any of us signed up for. Rogue Refiner has a powerful ETB, attacks for three in the control matchup, replaces itself without additional mana investment, can be played proactively, actually trades with creatures in creature matchups, is very good to copy or blink, and is a three drop in your quadruple Lotus Cobra deck. Sometimes you board them out and that's totally fine. The one place it is almost certainly worse than Rallier is on mulligans to five, where I think you often need Rallier to get back a fetchland to get back into the game.
My other four drops overperformed as well. Restoration Angel provides a huge boost to our defensive capabilities; the fact that it also goes infinite with Kiki is just icing on the cake. Pia and Kiran were amazing and it actually makes me sad that I'm not running them maindeck in the list I'm trying out next. Worship was absurd all day and I'm probably never going to cut it.
Wins: Bogles, Humans
Losses: Humans, Ad Nauseam, some brew with a bunch of Walls that I can't beat without comboing on turn 3-4.
Drew: Burn, but he was a glacially slow player and was dead on board.
Keranos is possibly on the chopping block in favor of a Rec Sage, and I think I want to have access to a Tracker post sideboard since games almost always slow down. Possibly want a third Rallier, but that card probably is fighting Restoration Angel for the slot, and I think Angel is a keeper. Also wouldn't hate a copy of EE. Still undecided on Acidic Slime and could get behind Avalanche Riders. 2x Fiery Justice and 1x Worship are both great. Ambusher actually did some things on Sunday but I don't know if it was good enough.
Question: Do you keep this seven OTP post board against Ad Nauseam: BoP Cobra Kiki Voice fetch fetch forest? I kept based on turn 3 Kiki-Jiki which gives us three draw steps to find one of our six cards that win on the spot, Gaddock Teeg, Eidolon of Rhetoric, Glen Elendra Archmage, or Oath/Refiner which give us a ton of redraws. Then I lost my Cobra to Thoughtseize on turn 1 and died without much resistance.
Before my last-minute modifications, I also had a list with three Ralliers, three Felidar Guardians, and three Reflector Mages, but it only had eight mana creatures (Only 3 Cobras. Tilt.) and three Evolutions. I won't go back to it until I get tilted off of playing four Evolutions.
I agree with maniospas, tutoring for a 5-drop should not be your only plan vs Humans. While it works often, you won't always have a draw that can get a 5-drop into play quickly, and cards like Reflector Mage and Kitesail Freebooter make it harder. In addition to that, Gearhulk lets them keep a Mantis Rider in play, while Glorybringer is probably not what you want to be doing against a deck with 3-4 Phantasmal Image.
@itslightninghelixomg: 9 mana creatures plus 23 lands is a lot, you could consider going down a land to 22. I personally don't like having more than 5 shocklands in my deck, drawing multiples in the opening hand can be quite painful.
Rogue Refiner is very interesting, but I'm not sure it's actually better than Renegade Rallier. They're obviously very similar: The cmc and body are identical, the mana cost is similar with Rallier being slightly easier to accomodate, and they both generate card advantage in some form when they enter. Rallier is clearly the more swingy card, since it sometimes lacks Revolt or targets of value. Also, it can be interacted with by grave hate like Scavenging Ooze or fetchland hate like Blood Moon or Leonin Arbiter. It's floor is clearly lower than that of Rogue Refiner, which will just reliably draw a card whenever it enters the battlefield. However, when Rallier returns a land that you actually need (usually for Cobra), a valuable creature (Voice, Gaddock etc) or Oath of Nissa, it's a lot more powerful than Refiner, because in addition to the raw card advantage, you also get something else: an extra land directly into play, a creature that you don't need to pay for or the card selection from Oath. (Rallier returning Horizon Canopy is slightly worse than casting Refiner unless you have Cobra.) Another minor but valuable aspect of Rallier is that it can allow us to quickly get lots of basics into play in Blood Moon matchups.
All in all, Rallier, despite its lower floor, has a much higher ceiling in my eyes. On balance, the chance to do something unfair with it (if you play the necessary numbers of fetchlands and Cobras) seems worth more than the consistency of Refiner to me.
Oops, I copy+pasted the deck and didn't remove the Steam Vents. That's kinda embarrassing, given that I even wrote that Steam Vents sucked. Fixing that.
I think I had too many situations come up in my small sample size of testing + tournament games that Renegade Rallier was getting you back lands that you didn't actually need. That almost pushes you towards needing to sit on Rallier to try and get something else back later in the game, which isn't even good logic because losing out on board position often matters.
I didn't mention before but I guess it kind of goes without saying: Refiner can be cast after a Saheeli +1. Given that Saheeli +1's put cards on the bottom the vast majority of the time, Refiner drawing a card is even more powerful than usual.
Went 3-1 at my LGS tonight, with the same 4c Cobra list I wrote about a few times, with one exception: Hallowed Fountain out for a basic Mountain. I was a lot more happy with my ability to cast Kiki jiki this way, and having only 4 shocklands (GW, UG, RG, RW) actually let me save some life on multiple occasions. Since my only blue spells are 4 Saheeli and 1 Reflector Mage, having just one blue land seems sufficient.
I played against Humans in the finals and lost, but my sideboard plan (2 Bolt, 2 Fiery Justice, 1 Qasali Ambusher, 1 Worship) seemed good. It's still not a matchup I actively want to face, but feels close to 50/50.
Has anyone else tried Jeff Hoogland's last take on Saheeli/Evolution with Phantasmal Image?
I had a go at it in a few friendly games on MTGO and it seemed decent. Not getting to live the dream of Lotus Cobra, Fetch, Renegade Rallier dream is a bit sad but the deck seems to work so far.
That list looks a little strange to me. Phantasmal Image is powerful, but why run only 1 Rallier with it? Wouldn't it be better to run more of them, since returning Image to copy Rallier is such a nice synergy? Also, this list has 4 Saheeli, 4 Felidar, 4 Evo, 1 Kiki, so it's definitely trying to combo a lot, but how does Image support that plan? It can be a "cheap" 3/4cmc creature to enable Evolution for Kiki, but doesn't Lotus Cobra gives us even more explosiveness? I guess copying Felidar to flicker Oath allows us to chain a lot of Oath triggers together to eventually combo, but without Cobra that can take some time.
Maybe the power and utility of Image justify its lack of direct synergy with the combo core of the deck, I would have to playtest that. It can do a whole lot for just 2 mana, and scales very well into the later turns, but on the other hand it isn't always good on turn 2.
I agree with all of your points on Image being good with Rallier but mostly bad with deck's core. Although it was an interesting experiment I don't particularly care for the direction of the Phantasmal Saheeli list and I wouldn't spend too long bending over backwards trying to rationalize it -- it was a donation list sent in for him to play, not something Hoogland designed.
Some Comments:
The Idea is that the maindeck is combo-focused, while being able to survive against most decks with Reflector Mage, Shalai and Voices to some extent. The 2 Images allow some sweet plays mentioned before (getting it back with rallier, copy him, etc.) Shalai and Tracker "overperformed" in someones above comment so they are in the main. What do you guys think of this list?
I'd say 10 fetches is a little on the low end for a list with 4 Cobra and 4 Rallier, and having both basic Island and basic Mountain isn't optimal with 4 Voices in the deck. If you want to be combo centric, you probably want Felidars number 3 and 4 before Thalia's Lancers deserves a spot (currently you have 2 Felidar + 4 Evo = 6 pieces for one half of the combo and 4 Saheeli + 1 Kiki + 1 Lancers + 4 Evo = 10 pieces for the other half).
Your sideboard looks decent, but you could consider a few "free win" cards like Stony Silence, Rest in Peace, Blood Moon or Worship. I very much like 2x Gaddock Teeg though, my opinion of the card is continously getting better and better, especially in the 4x Rallier versions.
Hey, I have been playing the following decklist. I am having trouble with what to put into the sideboard. Im struggling a bit with Jund and Jeskai control.
@Maniospas I haven't played against jund or jeskai since I added the Keranos in the sideboard. Haven't shaved Saheelis in the matchup against Jund before so Ill try that out. Jeskai's mixture of cheap removal paired with Wraths and Cryptics just feels very hard to beat.
Can we put in maybe 2 leyline of sanctity in our sideboard? For the jund and storm match up? Kindly enlighten me if theres any discussion about leyline sanctity before? I think i saw a 5-0 list before with 2 leyline in mtggoldfish.. Thanks.
Is Scavenging Ooze better than Rest in Peace? Currently I have been running a 1 of Rest in Peace to deal with the more graveyard oriented meta at my LGS, but I've still found my Hollow One and Storm matchups abysmal.
I think you have the right idea with RIP. ScOoze has the benefit of being a creature but is more of a broad-spectrum value card than a fast and clean answer to degenerate graveyard strategies. Even if you tutor for him T2 he can be too slow and mana-intensive to shut down these decks. I think you could even go up to 2x RIP in the side (as Emzed has done at times) for that meta and if needed diversify your value creatures away from grave reliance (Tracker over some Ralliers, Wall/Oracle over some Voices, etc).
4x Birds of Paradise
4x Lotus Cobra
4x Renegade Rallier
4x Voice of Resurgence
2x Felidar Guardian
2x Reflector Mage
1x Huntmaster of the Fells
1x Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker
1x Noble Hierarch
1x Shalai, Voice of Plenty
1x Thragtusk
1x Tireless Tracker
Spells(12)
4x Eldritch Evolution
4x Oath of Nissa
4x Saheeli Rai
4x Misty Rainforest
4x Windswept Heath
3x Flooded Strand
2x Horizon Canopy
2x Forest
2x Plains
1x Breeding Pool
1x Hallowed Fountain
1x Sacred Foundry
1x Stomping Ground
1x Temple Garden
2x Fiery Justice
2x Stony Silence
2x Unified Will
1x Blood Moon
1x Eidolon of the Rhetoic
1x Gaddock Teeg
1x Izzet Staticaster
1x Lone Missionary
1x Magus of the Moon
1x Obstinate Baloth
1x Reclamation Sage
1x Scavenging Ooze
My matchups went as follow, I won't go into anything as it just standard play. I will say that I probably had a 55/45 split between games won via combo vs games won via beatdown. That said, there were certainly countless times where my opponents made sub-optimal plays in order to respect a potential combo, which is obviously one of the decks greatest strengths.
Round 1: 5 Color Zoo (2-0)
Round 2: Jeskai Control (2-1)
Round 3: UW Control (2-1)
Round 4: Zur?! (2-0)
Round 5: Goryo's As Foretold (0-2)
Round 6: RG Valakut (2-1)
Round 7: Affinity (2-1)
Round 8: Burn (2-0)
Round 9: ID
Top 8: Zoo (0-2)
All of the matches that I had felt winnable except the As Foretold deck where he killed me on Turn 3 in both games. Honestly, I have no idea if we can do ANYTHING against them except play stuff like RiP or maybe Loaming Shaman? I am not really concerned about fixing the matchup and will glady take the auto-loss here. RG Valkaut is also a fairly bad matchup and I was only able to win Game 2 by turboing out the combo and Game 3 by my opponent misplaying and attempting to pay a Pact trigger with only 1 Forest in play while I had a Magus. I may want something else going forward for this matchup.
Both of my control games felt a little unfavored preboard but very favored postboard. The aggro decks that I was worried about with previous iterations of the deck are much easier with the inclusion of Reflector Mage and Justice out of the board.
While I didn't play against Humans, Hollow One, or Mardu I tested extensively against all 3 of those decks and feel them to be even to favorable matchups. Reflector Mage pulls a lot of weight against the first two.
As for individual card choices:
-Shalai over-performed all day. It was lights out against Burn and was a nice roadblock against Valakut.
-Huntmaster, however, was meh all day. Whenever I tutored it was almost ways for Shalai first or Guardian if I was going for the combo. When I casted him from hand he was never amazing but was overall okay. P&K may be a better card here, though there were plenty of times that I would have been unable to cast P&K where Huntmaster would have been castable.
-Rallier was also very good all day. There was only 1 time during the day where I had to cast a naked Rallier and even then it served as a removal spell to trade in combat. It consistently dug me out of games all day by either generating card draw via Oath or Canopy or just generating value with Voice. As I have always felt, the card is a cornerstone of the deck and I will continue playing 4.
-Kiki was good. It was stuck in my hand on a couple of occasions and I was able to cast it from hand in the Top 8 where it could have done more had I not had to mull to 5. I think it has warranted it's spot.
-SB was fine. Teeg was great against control. I never saw Eidolon and if I don't expect any Storm maybe I don't need it and with Shalai being in the deck maybe I could use the slot for other, more common matchups, but I know the first time I die to a Grapeshot because I decided to cut it I am going to want to die.
Also, I had a friend come with a list very similar to the Atlanta list. He went 6-3. There was another guy playing the deck there as well. I didn't see very many of his game but he was still playing Sun Titan. I believe he also went 6-3.
If you have any questions, feel free to ask!
BGStandard Green AggroGB
UWRGModern Saheeli CobraGRWU
UBRGLegacy StormGRBU
Wizards Certified Rules Advisor
11-3-1 @ GP Copenhagen: Top Stories of Grand Prix Copenhagen
Also, when you have Cobra and Tracker, its like playing a free Divination every turn. It's glorious.
As for colorless lands, I haven't tested any. Our mana is good but certainly greedy and while I love me some Township, I don't know if the mana can support it. Again, I haven't tested, but in my games so far I have had plenty of opening starts where a colorless land would have really hurt my mana
BGStandard Green AggroGB
UWRGModern Saheeli CobraGRWU
UBRGLegacy StormGRBU
Wizards Certified Rules Advisor
11-3-1 @ GP Copenhagen: Top Stories of Grand Prix Copenhagen
BGStandard Green AggroGB
UWRGModern Saheeli CobraGRWU
UBRGLegacy StormGRBU
Wizards Certified Rules Advisor
4 Birds of Paradise
4 Lotus Cobra
4 Voice of Resurgence
4 Renegade Rallier
1 Eternal Witness
1 Reflector Mage
4 Felidar Guardian
1 Shalai, Voice of Plenty
1 Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker
1 Thragtusk
1 Sun Titan
Planeswalkers
4 Saheeli Rai
4 Eldritch Evolution
Enchantments
4 Oath of Nissa
Lands
4 Windswept Heath
3 Wooded Foothills
3 Flooded Strand
1 Breeding Pool
1 Hallowed Fountain
1 Sacred Foundry
2 Stomping Ground
2 Temple Garden
1 Horizon Canopy
2 Forest
2 Plains
3 Fiery Justice
1 Kataki, War's Wage
1 Eidolon of Rhetoric
1 Obstinate Baloth
1 Aegis of the Gods
1 Sigarda, Host of Herons
1 Courser of Kruphix
1 Reflector Mage
1 Acidic Slime
2 Reclamation Sage
2 Worship
The tournament was three rounds.
Round 1: Fight!
UR Storm (2-1 games, 1-0 overall)
Game 1: He stumbles on lands and I beat him down value-wise without revealing the combo.
Game 2: I smugly drop Shalai thinking I had some time. However, He just went off and killed the Shalai before directing the rest of the damage at me with double Grapeshot.
Game 3: I have the nuts. I go turn 1 Forest, Birds of Paradise. He Serum Visions. Turn 2 I drop Lotus Cobra, drop and crack a fetch, play Saheeli Rai. He drops Baral. Turn three I drop a Felidar Guardian and win. He had a Remand but did not respect the combo.
Round 2: Fight!
Jund (1-1-1 games, 1-0-1 overall)
Game 1: I play the attrition war and got a lot of mileage out of copying a Voice of Resurgence with Kiki-Jiki. Unfortunately, I was low on life and could not profitably attack without leaving myself vulnerable. Game went on forever and my combo was not forthcoming, but I eventually see it and get the win as time expired.
Game 2: He plays fat and shreds my hand.
Game 3: He didn't think we should even start the game as we wouldn't have enough time. I said that I would really like to see what happens. I kept a reasonable hand with Saheeli Rai, Birds of Paradise, and Oath of Nissa X 2. It seemed like my best chance to get there, but I could not find the Felidar Guardian to seal the deal and we ended up drawing.
Note: My opponent played s.l.o.w. and I unfortunately got lulled into his style and let him do it.
Round 3: Fight!
Elves (2-1 match, 2-0-1 overall)
Game 1: I have a reasonable hand, but he absolutely splooges elves all over the board and empties his hand on turn three, swinging for roughly a billion on turn four thanks to Ezuri.
Game 2: Fiery Justice decimates all of his important elves, leaving me ample time to combo off at leisure.
Game 3: My favorite Fiery Justice play of the night. He turn one forest, heritage druid. Turn two he casts Dwynen's Elite and follows that up with two more Heritage Druids and another Elvish Mystic. He did not play a land, so I Fiery Justice all of his mana dudes for a 5-for-1 as he wistfully looked at the bomb in his hand that undoubtedly would have been bad times for me had he been able to untap. We usually win after a 5-for-1.
Thoughts
The deck is great fun, though I am unsure about Sun Titan. I am considering adding Tireless Trackers to the side. Any other thoughts about the deck?
By the way, I cracked a Karn and a History of Benalia. Good times!
If you want put a high priority on beating Humans, play 2 Worship in your sideboard. I think it's by far the best card in this specific matchup (but not quite as good vs Affinity, Hollow One etc). Other than that, play cards that interact favorably with Mantis Rider. We can hold the ground most of the time and their disruption doesn't hit us all that hard, but flying beaters are very problematic.
What do you guys think is the best cheap spot removal vs Humans? It would be Path but it's such an obvious choice with Meddling Mage, I wouldn't go all in on that. Lightning Bolt? Condemn?
I've spent some time recently trying to tinker with this deck and thought I'd share a list I recently played (that I might have made some hasty modifications pre-event) and where I'm trying to go next.
First, a list I played at a tournament last Sunday, which might have been derailed by some last-minute changes inspired by beakid's 5-0 list from June 1st:
4 Birds of Paradise
1 Noble Hierarch
4 Lotus Cobra
3 Voice of Resurgence
1 Gaddock Teeg
2 Reflector Mage
2 Renegade Rallier
2 Rogue Refiner
2 Felidar Guardian
1 Glen Elendra Archmage
1 Restoration Angel
1 Pia and Kiran Nalaar
1 Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker
1 Thragtusk
1 Sun Titan
4 Oath of Nissa
4 Saheeli Rai
3 Eldritch Evolution
Lands
4 Windswept Heath
4 Wooded Foothills
2 Flooded Strand
1 Breeding Pool
1 Stomping Ground
1 Sacred Foundry
1 Steam Vents
1 Temple Garden
1 Hallowed Fountain
2 Forest
2 Plains
2 Horizon Canopy
2 Fiery Justice
2 Qasali Ambusher
2 Obstinate Baloth
1 Worship
1 Kataki, War's Wage
1 Acidic Slime
1 Izzet Staticaster
1 Keranos, God of Storms
1 Sigarda, Host of Herons
1 Scavenging Ooze
1 Lone Missionary
1 Eidolon of Rhetoric
There's numerous problems with this list that I'll just spit out right now: Steam Vents is extremely bad (I knew I was going to be heavier in blue than others but the card is so much worse than the eleventh fetch and it's not close.), Glen Elendra Archmage isn't the Shalai I wanted (Archmage tested pretty well actually until I remembered Shalai exists, Archmage replaces a Baloth in the SB if I get it), the 4th Evolution absolutely should be there (especially on only two Cats), and I'm probably never going to play Gaddock Teeg in the main ever again unless a strong metagame shift calls for it. I think the biggest problem is that I got a little too cute and stopped trying to be a combo deck. I went 2-3-1, only assembling the combo in a single game, and only had the ability to go for it one other time, where the Humans player Gut Shot me, though I still had to go for it because my only cards in hand were Voices and there was a Meddling Mage in play naming Voice. I did assemble Kiki + Thragtusk in game 1 to beat a triple Thalia's Lieutenant draw, so that was pretty hot.
That being said, there's a lot of successful stuff going on in this list that I want to mention too. We'll start with the elephant in the room: Rogue Refiner. Rogue Refiner is gas. As an outsider, I noticed that a lot of the deck's three drops are extremely susceptible to a strict and detrimental timing window. Reflector Mage would prefer to be held to bounce an impactful card, Tireless Tracker is not-so-secretly a four drop, and Renegade Rallier for no value is not what any of us signed up for. Rogue Refiner has a powerful ETB, attacks for three in the control matchup, replaces itself without additional mana investment, can be played proactively, actually trades with creatures in creature matchups, is very good to copy or blink, and is a three drop in your quadruple Lotus Cobra deck. Sometimes you board them out and that's totally fine. The one place it is almost certainly worse than Rallier is on mulligans to five, where I think you often need Rallier to get back a fetchland to get back into the game.
My other four drops overperformed as well. Restoration Angel provides a huge boost to our defensive capabilities; the fact that it also goes infinite with Kiki is just icing on the cake. Pia and Kiran were amazing and it actually makes me sad that I'm not running them maindeck in the list I'm trying out next. Worship was absurd all day and I'm probably never going to cut it.
Wins: Bogles, Humans
Losses: Humans, Ad Nauseam, some brew with a bunch of Walls that I can't beat without comboing on turn 3-4.
Drew: Burn, but he was a glacially slow player and was dead on board.
The next step for me is this list:
4 Birds of Paradise
1 Noble Hierarch
4 Lotus Cobra
4 Voice of Resurgence
2 Reflector Mage
2 Renegade Rallier
2 Rogue Refiner
3 Felidar Guardian
1 Shalai, Voice of Plenty
1 Restoration Angel
1 Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker
1 Thragtusk
Spells
4 Oath of Nissa
4 Saheeli Rai
4 Eldritch Evolution
4 Windswept Heath
4 Wooded Foothills
3 Flooded Strand
1 Breeding Pool
1 Stomping Ground
1 Sacred Foundry
1 Temple Garden
1 Hallowed Fountain
2 Forest
2 Plains
2 Horizon Canopy
2 Fiery Justice
1 Glen Elendra Archmage
1 Pia and Kiran Nalaar
1 Qasali Ambusher
1 Obstinate Baloth
1 Worship
1 Kataki, War's Wage
1 Acidic Slime
1 Izzet Staticaster
1 Keranos, God of Storms
1 Sigarda, Host of Herons
1 Scavenging Ooze
1 Gaddock Teeg
1 Eidolon of Rhetoric
Keranos is possibly on the chopping block in favor of a Rec Sage, and I think I want to have access to a Tracker post sideboard since games almost always slow down. Possibly want a third Rallier, but that card probably is fighting Restoration Angel for the slot, and I think Angel is a keeper. Also wouldn't hate a copy of EE. Still undecided on Acidic Slime and could get behind Avalanche Riders. 2x Fiery Justice and 1x Worship are both great. Ambusher actually did some things on Sunday but I don't know if it was good enough.
Question: Do you keep this seven OTP post board against Ad Nauseam: BoP Cobra Kiki Voice fetch fetch forest? I kept based on turn 3 Kiki-Jiki which gives us three draw steps to find one of our six cards that win on the spot, Gaddock Teeg, Eidolon of Rhetoric, Glen Elendra Archmage, or Oath/Refiner which give us a ton of redraws. Then I lost my Cobra to Thoughtseize on turn 1 and died without much resistance.
Before my last-minute modifications, I also had a list with three Ralliers, three Felidar Guardians, and three Reflector Mages, but it only had eight mana creatures (Only 3 Cobras. Tilt.) and three Evolutions. I won't go back to it until I get tilted off of playing four Evolutions.
@itslightninghelixomg: 9 mana creatures plus 23 lands is a lot, you could consider going down a land to 22. I personally don't like having more than 5 shocklands in my deck, drawing multiples in the opening hand can be quite painful.
Rogue Refiner is very interesting, but I'm not sure it's actually better than Renegade Rallier. They're obviously very similar: The cmc and body are identical, the mana cost is similar with Rallier being slightly easier to accomodate, and they both generate card advantage in some form when they enter. Rallier is clearly the more swingy card, since it sometimes lacks Revolt or targets of value. Also, it can be interacted with by grave hate like Scavenging Ooze or fetchland hate like Blood Moon or Leonin Arbiter. It's floor is clearly lower than that of Rogue Refiner, which will just reliably draw a card whenever it enters the battlefield. However, when Rallier returns a land that you actually need (usually for Cobra), a valuable creature (Voice, Gaddock etc) or Oath of Nissa, it's a lot more powerful than Refiner, because in addition to the raw card advantage, you also get something else: an extra land directly into play, a creature that you don't need to pay for or the card selection from Oath. (Rallier returning Horizon Canopy is slightly worse than casting Refiner unless you have Cobra.) Another minor but valuable aspect of Rallier is that it can allow us to quickly get lots of basics into play in Blood Moon matchups.
All in all, Rallier, despite its lower floor, has a much higher ceiling in my eyes. On balance, the chance to do something unfair with it (if you play the necessary numbers of fetchlands and Cobras) seems worth more than the consistency of Refiner to me.
I think I had too many situations come up in my small sample size of testing + tournament games that Renegade Rallier was getting you back lands that you didn't actually need. That almost pushes you towards needing to sit on Rallier to try and get something else back later in the game, which isn't even good logic because losing out on board position often matters.
I didn't mention before but I guess it kind of goes without saying: Refiner can be cast after a Saheeli +1. Given that Saheeli +1's put cards on the bottom the vast majority of the time, Refiner drawing a card is even more powerful than usual.
I played against Humans in the finals and lost, but my sideboard plan (2 Bolt, 2 Fiery Justice, 1 Qasali Ambusher, 1 Worship) seemed good. It's still not a matchup I actively want to face, but feels close to 50/50.
I had a go at it in a few friendly games on MTGO and it seemed decent. Not getting to live the dream of Lotus Cobra, Fetch, Renegade Rallier dream is a bit sad but the deck seems to work so far.
Maybe the power and utility of Image justify its lack of direct synergy with the combo core of the deck, I would have to playtest that. It can do a whole lot for just 2 mana, and scales very well into the later turns, but on the other hand it isn't always good on turn 2.
BGStandard Green AggroGB
UWRGModern Saheeli CobraGRWU
UBRGLegacy StormGRBU
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Hoogland's updated Kiki Midrange deck with Chain Whirler, however, looks fun! But that's a deck for another thread.
I've been reading everything you guys said so far and compiled "my own" list.
4 Birds of Paradise
4 Lotus Cobra
2 Phantasmal Image
4 Voice of Resurgance
2 Reflector Mage
4 Renegade Rallier
1 Tireless Tracker
2 Felidar Guardian
1 Shalai, Voice of Plenty
1 Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker
1 Thalia's Lancers
Spells
4 Saheeli Rai
4 Eldritch Evolution
4 Oath of Nissa
4 Windswept Heath
3 Misty Rainforest
3 Wooded Foothills
2 Forest
1 Island
1 Mountain
1 Plains
1 Hallowed Fountain
1 Breeding Pool
1 Sacred Foundry
1 Stomping Ground
1 Temple Garden
2 Horizon Canopy
2 Qasali Pridemage
2 Gaddock Teeg
1 Kataki, War's Wage
1 Pia and Kiran Nalaar
1 Obstinate Baloth
1 Thragtusk
1 Sigarda, Host of Herons
2 Worship
2 Qasali Ambusher
1 Izzet Staticaster
1 Meddling Mage
Some Comments:
The Idea is that the maindeck is combo-focused, while being able to survive against most decks with Reflector Mage, Shalai and Voices to some extent. The 2 Images allow some sweet plays mentioned before (getting it back with rallier, copy him, etc.) Shalai and Tracker "overperformed" in someones above comment so they are in the main. What do you guys think of this list?
Your sideboard looks decent, but you could consider a few "free win" cards like Stony Silence, Rest in Peace, Blood Moon or Worship. I very much like 2x Gaddock Teeg though, my opinion of the card is continously getting better and better, especially in the 4x Rallier versions.
4 Birds of Paradise
4 Lotus Cobra
4 Voice of Resurgence
2 Reflector Mage
4 Renegade Rallier
3 Felidar Guardian
1 Shalai, Voice of Plenty
1 Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker
1 Acidic Slime
1 Thragtusk
1 Sun Titan
Enchantment(4)
4 Oath of Nissa
Sorcery(4)
4 Eldritch Evolution
4 Saheeli Rai
Land(22)
1 Breeding Pool
1 Field of Ruin
3 Flooded Strand
2 Forest
1 Hallowed Fountain
1 Horizon Canopy
2 Plains
1 Sacred Foundry
1 Stomping Ground
1 Temple Garden
4 Windswept Heath
4 Wooded Foothills
1 Lone Missionary
2 Rest in Peace
2 Stony Silence
1 Unified Will
1 Eidolon of Rhetoric
3 Fiery Justice
1 Izzet Staticaster
1 Reclamation Sage
1 Obstinate Baloth
1 Keranos, God of Storms
Also, is it worth it to play a third red source to be able to hardcast kiki without Birds/Cobra and if so, what can i replace. Thanks